The disclaimer telling all of you that I don't own any Archer characters is in a meeting. I don't know what it is, but I like doing meeting fics! So here's another one!
Lonely At The Top
"OH FOR CHRIST'S SAKE!" Cyril yelled at the people inside the broom closet. "SERIOUSLY? I JUST RESTOCKED THIS!"
"Oh relax Cyril," Archer said as he zipped up his zipper. "We didn't even knock anything over!"
"Really you two?" Cyril closed his eyes as the two finished getting dressed. "Did you have to do it in the broom closet?"
"Well no," Archer remarked. "We considered doing it in one of our offices. But we didn't want to make a mess."
"Not to mention increase your chances of your mother barging in!" Cyril snapped.
"That too," Lana admitted.
"We're having a meeting in the conference room in ten minutes!" Cyril snapped. "Just get your assignments and be there!" He stormed off.
"Morning sex and annoying Cyril," Archer laughed. "It doesn't get any better than this!"
"Oh shit," Lana groaned. "I forgot about the stupid assignment."
"That's right! I gotta get prepared!" Archer realized.
"You actually did something?" Lana did a double take. "I would have thought blowing off any work Cyril gave you was…"
"A given?" Archer finished. "Normally I would but honestly I've been getting a little bored around here. I've decided to treat it as an exercise in creativity."
"You mean how to creatively annoy Cyril?" Lana raised an eyebrow.
"Is there any other definition?" Archer asked. "I'll show you at the meeting." He went off.
"Oh this will not end well," Lana groaned.
She went to the meeting room to find Pam, Cheryl and Mallory already there. "I guess no one is blowing off this stupid meeting," Lana remarked.
"Can you believe Cyril gave us homework?" Pam snapped. "We had to come up with one productive thing for the agency!"
"Well I don't know about you idiots but at least I'm doing something productive. I'm going through my contact address books again," Mallory explained. "And updating them to a new one. Getting rid of people that are no longer among the living…Or those I wish weren't…"
"How many pages have you filed out in your new book?" Pam asked.
"One…" Mallory groaned. "I mean look at this book alone!" She held up a book filled with mostly crossed out names. "Dead, dead, dead, someone I wish was dead…Dead!"
"That's not good," Lana frowned.
"No kidding!" Mallory groaned as she flipped through the book. "Dead, dead, dead, dead…Probably still in prison. I need to check. Dead. Dead. Missing for years in the Amazon Rainforest and probably dead. Dead. Alzheimer's so he probably doesn't remember me anyway. Dead. Dead from the waist down…"
"I'm assuming you mean paralyzed," Lana remarked.
"No, just really lousy in the sack…" Mallory groaned. "But I'll put him in the maybe pile. Oh who am I kidding?"
"I'm going to take a guess and say that we won't be able to rely much on your contact list," Lana sighed as Mallory crossed out another name.
"You assume correctly," Mallory sighed as she looked at the book. "Dead, dead, dead, this one is definitely in prison and should be dead. This other one is dead broke so he might as well be dead…Oh my God. Francis Chermbero. He died ten years ago! I was at his funeral! I really should have done this sooner."
"Duh!" Cheryl rolled her eyes.
"Here's a tip," Mallory sighed. "Try to outlive your enemies but not your allies."
"Here we go…" Archer walked in with a small disk drive. "Okay how do you upload your files onto this thing?" He indicated the large television/computer screen on the wall.
"There's a slot right there," Lana indicated. "What are you up to?"
"You'll see!" Archer grinned as he did so. Then he took a seat as the others came in.
"Good morning everyone…" Cyril said as he began the meeting.
"What's good about it?" Mallory grumbled. "We're running out of scotch again!"
"I'll alert the National Guard," Cyril said dryly. "Okay you all know your assignment. Try to come up with something productive for the agency. Anything productive. Cheryl why don't you start us off?"
"We were supposed to do something?" Cheryl blinked.
"And that takes care of Cheryl's part…" Cyril groaned. "Anyone else want to go?"
"Ooh! Ooh! Ooh!" Pam raised her hand. "Me! ME! ME!"
"Yes, Arnold Horshack," Cyril sighed. "Go ahead."
"Two words," Pam spoke up. "Taco Tuesdays!"
"Next!" Cyril groaned. "Ms. Archer…"
"Still working on my contact list," Mallory admitted.
"And still not getting any contacts," Cheryl spoke up. "Unless I contact the old gypsy woman and convince her to teach Ms. Archer how to be a medium."
"Considering half of Ms. Archer's contacts are dead and the other half want nothing to do with us because we're blacklisted I wasn't expecting much," Cyril sighed. "But keep trying Ms. Archer. At least you were trying unlike the rest of you slackers!"
"Hey! Ray and I worked on our project all weekend!" Krieger protested. "Well mostly me…"
"Mostly? I wrote the god damn mission statement on our website while you were experimenting with new drug combinations!" Ray barked.
"Drug combinations for our agency," Krieger added. "Mostly for recreational use…"
"We have a website?" Archer blinked.
"We do now," Ray told him. He took out a laptop and uploaded the webpage on the large computer screen. "Look!"
"That's our website?" Archer grimaced. "It's boring and dull. Which fits into Cyril's personality I admit…"
"You know…?" Cyril glared at him.
"You couldn't have at least put some pictures of me on there?" Archer snapped.
"Well we wanted it to be professional Archer," Ray gave him a look. "Not just another porn site."
"Let me read the mission statement," Cyril looked at it.
"Let me guess," Archer rolled his eyes. "Some vague generic crap that is supposed to make us sound good?"
"I didn't exactly have that much to work with," Ray gave him a look.
Cyril started to read. "We are a crack team of highly experienced ex-government contractors…"
Mallory rolled her eyes. "More like a crackpot team of highly experienced ex-spies, ex-drug dealers, ex-government over throwers of San Marcos, ex-country music singers, ex-CIA screw ups."
"Fully trained in all manner of espionage techniques," Cyril kept reading. "Evidence gathering and investigative work…"
"More like avoiding work techniques, destroying evidence and investigating which bars have the best scotch," Pam snorted.
Cyril went on. "Serving the full spectrum of clients from private citizens to the private sector…"
"Like the Yakuza, the Mob, the Mexican cartels," Lana added. "Crazy crackpots that wanted to establish a weird sex colony on Mars."
"Drug farmers," Cheryl added. "Those gang members we sold all those weapons and equipment to."
"Dictators," Ray added. "Warlords that wanted to blow up oil pipelines."
"That cardinal that wanted to kill the Pope," Pam added.
"Cyborgs and ex-KGB agents," Archer added.
"Blackmailers," Ray added.
"Brain dead billionaires," Mallory added.
"Double agents," Lana added.
"Ocelots!" Cheryl spoke up.
"I get it! We haven't exactly had the most pristine clientele over the years!" Cyril snapped.
"I can see why you wanted to keep that part vague in the mission statement," Archer admitted to Ray.
"Duh!" Ray rolled his eyes.
"From law firms to law enforcement," Cyril went on.
"Which we've used for years to avoid prosecution for all the crimes we committed," Lana sighed.
"No job is too big or too small," Cyril added.
"As long as we get paid," Ray added.
"If you have a problem, if no one else can help," Cyril finished. "Why not hire the Figgis Agency?"
"You ripped that last part off from the A-Team!" Archer snapped.
"It works doesn't it?" Ray snapped.
"At least it's something!" Cyril added. "So Krieger and Ray did their assignments. What about the rest of you?"
"We were supposed to do something?" Cheryl asked again.
"We already did you," Pam said to her.
"A statement most people in this room can say," Mallory remarked.
"Speaking of doing something," Cyril sighed. "Lana you're the one person here with some sense of workplace ethics. Tell me what you did."
"Uh yeah well…" Lana began.
"You didn't do anything either did you?" Cyril made an exasperated noise.
"You were too busy doing something else in the broom closet," Cheryl snorted. "Actually some-."
Cheryl made a choking sound when Lana grabbed her neck. "I was restocking the broom closet with Archer," Lana glared at her and then Cyril. "Cyril you saw me restock it with Archer. Remember?"
"Fine," Cyril made a noise of resignation.
"Ha! Ha!" Archer laughed.
"And I'm guessing Archer you're going to use the same excuse as Lana for your assignment," Cyril sighed.
"Wrong again, Detective Clue-Less-so!" Archer said. "I have come up with three different presentations!"
"Oh this should be good," Lana folded her arms.
"Presentation Number One!" Archer stood at the front of the table. "What is our agency's main problem?"
"Lack of clients and income," Cyril sighed.
"Lack of recommendations and referrals," Mallory added.
"No one out here knows us," Lana added.
"And the people who do know us wouldn't hire us to pick up their garbage," Ray groaned. "Much less do work for them."
"We don't have a cute mascot?" Pam spoke up.
"Wrong! It's branding!" Archer turned on one of his presentations. On screen the words. ARCHER AGENCY glowed.
"We're not changing the name!" Cyril shouted. "No way! No how! Not now! Not ever!"
"So we're putting a pin on that," Archer shrugged. "Which leads me to my second presentation."
Archer pushed a few buttons on a small remote. The lights went off and colored strobe lights began to glow. Pulsating dance music began to play. "What the…?" Ray blinked.
"Taco Tuesdays!" Archer called out as another graphic appeared on screen. It said TACO TUESDAY with dancing tacos around it.
"Oh for the love of…" Mallory rubbed her head in anticipation of a headache.
"When I say Taco you say…" Archer called out.
"Tuesday!" Pam shouted.
"Taco!" Archer shouted.
"Tuesday!" Pam yelled.
"Taco!" Archer shouted.
"Tuesday!" Pam shouted.
"TACO!" Archer called out.
"TUESDAY!" Pam and Cheryl called out.
"TACO!" Archer called out.
"TUESDAY!" Pam, Cheryl, Ray and Krieger shouted.
"TACO!" Archer shouted.
"TUESDAY!" Pam, Cheryl, Ray and Krieger cheered.
Milton zoomed in with a sombrero on top of him. He zoomed around the room as the others chanted.
"TACO! TACO! TUESDAY! TUESDAY!" Archer, Pam, Cheryl, Ray and Krieger cheered. "TACO! TACO! TUESDAY! TACO TACO TUESDAY!"
"ALL RIGHT KNOCK IT OFF!" Cyril screamed, as he turned off the strobe lights and turned on the regular ones. "You want freaking Taco freaking Tuesday so freaking bad, you assholes can have it! But you are responsible for it and you're cleaning up after it!"
He glared at Milton. "AND YOU GET OUT OF HERE!" Milton zoomed out.
"Yes!" Archer and Pam high fived each other.
"I swear your collective IQs get lower every year!" Mallory groaned. "Granted now that we are living in California that's probably par for the course…"
"Okay now I'm going to my third presentation," Archer said. "I had a feeling the website…Whenever we got one was going to be boring. So I have a plan to jazz it up a little."
Pictures of Archer in various poses were soon plastered on screen. "Oh God he does want to turn our website into a porn site," Ray groaned.
"I wouldn't call it porn…" Lana began.
Until a picture of a naked Archer on a bearskin rug covered only by a large ping pong paddle in a specific area was shown. "Okay now it's a porn site…" Lana groaned.
"Can't have anything nice…" Mallory groaned as she took a drink.
"So Archer basically your proposal is to plaster your face all over our website?" Cyril groaned.
"And then send out mass e-mail links!" Archer added. "To not just everyone in LA but all over the world."
"You mean send out a spam e-mail to billions of people all over the world just to promote your ego?" Lana snapped.
"It's not impossible," Krieger admitted. "Actually all we'd have to do is…"
"Krieger no!" Lana barked.
"Why don't we just stuff bright pink flyers on the windshields of every car all over the city while we're at it?" Mallory groaned.
"Flyers huh…?" Pam began to think. "Hmmm…."
"Archer we are not doing this for so many reasons…" Cyril sighed.
"Yeah how about pictures of us?" Pam shouted out.
"I've got some great naked pictures of myself!" Cheryl spoke up.
"Me too!" Krieger said.
"Wonderful Sterling!" Mallory grumbled. "If you put up naked pictures then everyone wants to put up naked pictures!"
"It's called democracy!" Cheryl snapped.
"It's called pornography," Ray told her.
"Which is under freedom of speech," Cheryl went on. "Which is under the Constitution which is part of our democracy!"
"Did no one learn anything from The People Vs. Larry Flint?" Krieger asked.
"I've learned you people are idiots," Mallory quipped. "No, that's not true. I've known that for a long time."
"By the way Archer," Cyril had a thought. "When was the last time you paid Trinette child support?"
"Uhh…" Archer's brain turned off for a second.
"The skanky whore you knocked up!" Cheryl prompted.
"As opposed to all the other skanky whores you slept with," Mallory quipped. "Present company included."
"HEY!" Lana, Cheryl and Pam snapped at the same time.
"Coming from the Queen of Skanky…" Cheryl began.
"HEY!" Mallory snarled, interrupting her.
"I'm going to take a guess and say it's been a while hasn't it?" Cyril groaned. "And I'm guessing the last check you remember writing was before San Marcos wasn't it?"
"Yeah but sometimes I let Woodhouse write the checks when I order him too," Archer admitted. "And then copy my…Oh wait…"
"And how long has it been since we've seen Woodhouse?" Mallory groaned. "Assuming he's not dead in a ditch somewhere?"
"Quite a while actually," Archer admitted. "Oh…"
"I'm guessing you missed a few payments," Cyril rolled his eyes. "So odds are Trinette is probably looking for you. With her lawyer…"
"You know now that I think about it," Archer remarked. "Maybe the website doesn't need to be redesigned for now? It does have that classic professional look…"
"Especially if Trinette is looking for you," Pam snorted.
"You know I think I'll just set this presentation aside for another day?" Archer turned off the screen. "It needs some fine tuning."
"Just as I thought," Cyril groaned. "So much for your help. Then again I suppose I shouldn't expect much from you people. I never have been able to count on you before. I guess it was stupid of me to think you'd help now!"
"Yeah pretty much," Cheryl laughed.
"So let's just move on to the rest of the meeting," Cyril sighed. "Item Two…We need to cut expenses!"
"Like what?" Archer scoffed.
"I'm glad you asked Archer!" Cyril snapped. "Like all those Playboy magazine subscriptions you charged to this office!"
"Oh sorry that was me," Pam spoke up. "What? I thought we could all use some extra morale around here? And nothing boosts morale like some naked titties!"
"Not for everyone," Ray grumbled. Lana glared at Pam as well.
"Chill-ax!" Pam waved. "I added a couple of Playgirls too. They're in my office. My bad."
"I hope you hold onto them because we're cancelling the subscriptions!" Cyril snapped. "Another expense is the phone bill!"
"This isn't your personal AT&T people," Lana said.
"I'm glad you feel that way Lana," Cyril glared at her. "Because you can no longer make personal calls to your parents! Or order new fashion boots from QVC!"
"Hey those are important calls!" Lana snapped. "The boots are for looking good at the office. At least I'm not calling sex party lines like some people I know!"
"It's not a sex party line!" Pam snapped. "It's a regular line for people looking to hook up with other people but still having nice conversations about regular things. Like beer recipes and jail stories."
"Or sniffing glue and dealing with ostrich hallucinations!" Cheryl added.
Cyril glared at her. "Here's a tip Cheryl. If you stop sniffing glue, you'll stop seeing ostriches!"
"That's just what the kangaroo said!" Cheryl gasped in surprise. "Do you know him?"
"Moving on…" Cyril sighed. "Who the hell is calling Dial a Prayer?"
"Uh…" Ray held up his hand sheepishly. "I'm trying to connect with my spiritual side more."
"What's his name?" Archer asked with a sigh.
"Reverend Luke," Ray admitted. "He's very nice and has some surprisingly modern thoughts about the New Testament. Which honestly I never really heard about before."
"Are you sure you used to be a minister?" Lana asked.
"What are all these phone calls to South American prisons?" Cyril shouted.
"Oh that was me," Mallory admitted. "I was trying to find out if I still had certain contacts. Or if some of them still held a grudge. Good news, the people I wanted to be dead are dead. The bad news…Those I didn't want to be dead are also dead."
"There are also calls to Russia and parts of Eastern Europe…" Cyril added.
"Also me," Mallory admitted. "I tried to reverse the charges but it didn't work."
"Ms. Archer…" Cyril groaned.
"I also made a few calls to New York, Washington DC," Mallory added. "It was all for work! I've been trying to salvage what few contacts I have left! Fat chance with Hawley blabbing his big mouth about us being blacklisted!"
"Did you call Brazil and Argentina?" Cyril asked.
"Who would I know in Brazil and Argentina?" Mallory asked. "Oh wait…"
Everyone looked at Krieger. "I have some friends I keep in touch with from time to time," He admitted.
"Don't really want to know any more than that," Cyril groaned. "Look guys! Cut down on the personal calls okay? We need to find ways to save money! Not spend it all! Or screw it all away!"
"When do we do that?" Archer asked.
"All the time!" Cyril shouted.
"Name one example!" Archer scoffed.
"Two days ago I asked you to get some supplies for the break room and you all went out on a donut run all over the city for an entire day!" Cyril shouted.
"We were comparison shopping for the best donuts!" Archer protested. "We had to test their tastiness, price and dunk-ability."
"Dunk-ability?" Cyril sighed.
Krieger added. "You know? How well a donut stands up to being dunked in coffee! It's actually a pretty interesting science."
"How about this for an example?" Cyril snapped. "The first week we were opened none of you came in because you were all clothes shopping on Rodeo Drive!"
"A, it wasn't all on Rodeo Drive," Archer pointed out. "And B, we needed new clothes anyway because half our stuff from New York still hasn't arrived!"
"In some cases confiscated by the CIA," Mallory admitted.
"Exactly! And you didn't even pay for our stuff," Archer spoke up. "Carol did!"
"And then she charged it as a business expense," Cyril groaned.
"Well were we supposed to just walk around naked or something?" Cheryl asked. "Wait can we do that?"
"Depends on…" Krieger began.
"NO! NO! NO!" Cyril snapped. "We are not going there!"
"Awwwww…." Cheryl and Krieger said in a disappointed tone.
"And then there were those three days I had to close down the office because we all had to go sightseeing!" Cyril shouted.
"We needed to get familiar with the area," Ray pointed out.
"He's right," Archer agreed. "And I remember you were right there with us sightseeing…"
"Okay that I admit to," Cyril spoke up.
"So what are you complaining about?" Archer asked.
"All those gift shop items you charged to the company!" Cyril shouted. "See this is what I'm talking about! If we don't get a client soon we could be closed down in less than six months!"
"It won't come to that," Archer waved.
"But it could!" Cyril shouted.
"It won't!" Archer rolled his eyes.
"It might!" Cyril shouted.
"Why are you so concerned with what if and what could be when it hasn't happened yet?" Archer groaned.
"BECAUSE THAT'S MY JOB!" Cyril shouted.
"It's a stupid job," Cheryl rolled her eyes.
"You know what? Forget it!" Cyril shouted. "Meeting adjourned!"
"So can we go?" Cheryl asked.
"YES!" Cyril screamed.
"You don't have to yell," Cheryl grumbled as the others left. Except for Cyril and Mallory.
"Hey I have a question," Pam asked as the others left. "On the references section of the website it lists a CM. Who is CM and how did you get his reference?"
"Let's just say in order to get a toaster a credit card you have to invent a first name," Krieger explained.
"Why would a toaster need a…?" Cyril did a double take. "Forget it! I don't want to know! I don't want to know!"
"It's not easy is it?" Mallory asked as everyone left. "Running an agency. Dealing with morons that spend more money than they make."
"No, it is not," Cyril put his head in his hands. "I never realized how stressful it actually is to run an agency. No wonder you were always yelling at us."
"I find drinking helps take the edge off," Mallory sighed as she pushed a bottle towards Cyril. He downed the rest of it in a single gulp.
"That a boy," Mallory grinned, knowing she had Cyril where she wanted him. "Take some advice from a pro. The only thing you can count on your employees to do is to screw up and screw around. That's why you can never fully trust them."
"Yeah just got the memo," Cyril grumbled.
"The reason they are all walking over you Cyril is let's face it," Mallory shrugged. "You're an easy target. Like a pack of jackals stalking an orphaned baby zebra. Together they can take you down."
"Is that why you were always trying to pit Lana and Archer against each other?" Cyril asked. "And the rest of us too?"
"Exactly," Mallory nodded. "I admit it. If Lana wasn't so distracted by Sterling she could have found a way to get my job. And Sterling too if he put his mind on something other than his penis for a minute. Thank God for horny libidos."
"Huh. That does explain why you kept putting those two together a lot on missions," Cyril realized.
"You need to keep an eye on everything and everyone if you want to make it as a leader," Mallory told him. "Or whatever it is you are."
"You're right," Cyril realized. "I can't trust any of them. I have to keep an eye out on them!"
"And then you can tell me everything," Mallory added. "So I can help you."
"They must think I'm an idiot!" Cyril snapped. "Well they're not going to pull the wool over Cyril Figgis' eyes!"
"To be fair their assessment of you isn't that far off…" Mallory grumbled under her breath.
"If they think they're going to screw around on my dime and build another secret Japanese bathhouse under my watch like they did back in New York," Cyril growled. "They have another think coming!"
"Wait what secret Japanese bathhouse in the janitor's closet?" Mallory did a double take.
"You can only screw with Cyril Figgis so long before he screws you back!" Cyril shouted.
"Yeah. Good for you. Could you back up please to the secret bathhouse in the janitor's closet for a minute?" Mallory snapped.
"Oh that?" Cyril asked. "Archer and everyone else on the committee used most of the ten million dollars the CIA gave us to rebuild our old office to make a secret Japanese bathhouse in the back of the janitor's closet. Had a lot of fun parties there."
"What?" Mallory shouted.
"You really didn't think it took ten million dollars to turn our office into the same old shithole it was before the CIA shut us down did you?" Cyril asked. "I mean most of the stuff was just sitting in storage. Didn't even cost a million to recreate the old office."
"So most of the money went to a secret bathhouse in a closet?" Mallory shouted.
"And a few kick ass parties," Cyril said. "We had quite a few of them on weekends."
"Is that why my water bill for the agency was so high last year?" Mallory shouted.
"That and the showers Archer and the others took every day," Cyril admitted. "And they figured out how to use the laundromat downstairs to clean their clothes for free."
"Those bastards!" Mallory was stunned. "I'll kill them!"
"It was Archer's idea," Cyril said as she got up.
"No kidding! STERLING!" Mallory shouted as she stormed out of the room. "STERLING MALLORY ARCHER!"
"This is going to be fun," Cyril snickered. "Maybe I might be able to use my position to make Archer's life even more miserable?"
"OWWWW! MOTHER!" Archer screamed.
"I wonder if I still have Trinette's e-mail?" Cyril remarked to himself. "I guess it wouldn't hurt if I sent her a link to the website. And put in a note that if she needs anyone found she could contact me directly…Heh, heh, heh…"